


if you come around again, then I will take the chain from off the door

by timeladyleo



Series: the knapp-shappey-shipwrights have a horrible christmas! [3]
Category: Cabin Pressure
Genre: Animal Death, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:21:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27902902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timeladyleo/pseuds/timeladyleo
Summary: If she’d thought the house was quiet without the dog, well, she couldn’t have imagined it missing a whole person.
Relationships: Carolyn Knapp-Shappey/Herc Shipwright
Series: the knapp-shappey-shipwrights have a horrible christmas! [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2039773
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14





	if you come around again, then I will take the chain from off the door

**Author's Note:**

> so this is a fic i actually originally wrote wayyyy back in 2015 that i've edited very much since then (delighted to see how much better i am than when i was 17) 
> 
> song is 'The Chain' by Ingrid Michaelson, and it's not a christmas song per se, but like it's a song that's been on my hercolyn playlist for a good number of years and has belonged to this idea since at least 2015

There was no breeze, and the evening felt stuffy and even though it was December. Carolyn always came in the evening, walking the long way up the road and through town to avoid the forest. These days, she always had to walk alone, empty hands. She hated having empty hands.

If she’d thought the house was quiet without the dog, well, she couldn’t have imagined it missing a whole person. 

She knelt by the grave, ignoring her knees as they groaned. Arthur had given her a bunch of flowers before she had left, bright and garish and red. She hated them. She hated flowers left by graves, the way they sagged. As if a graveyard needed more gloom. But she couldn’t say no to Arthur on matters like this anymore, didn’t even have the energy to bicker about it.

Covertly, she’d planted her own. That way she could pretend to have only come to water them, on days when she felt like she needed the excuse.

Not that she needed it today. A chill hung heavy in the air, clinging onto every surface. It would have been frosty if it wasn’t damp. Carolyn wished she’d put her gloves on after all, hands in pockets in an attempt to warm her cold knuckles.

Six months. Every day just rolled on, kept rolling on, water round a stone in a stream. Trying to go back to its normal flow. She had so wanted to hold onto normal, wanted things to feel as usual as they could. She had argued long and hard with Douglas about the future of OJS, hired a new first officer behind his back, disregarding his complaint. It was her airline, wasn’t it? She could replace him too, couldn’t she? If she wanted?

They both knew that wasn’t true. They both knew that Peter wasn’t a replacement. How could he be?

He was young, enthusiastic, nervous. Reminded them of Martin in all the worst ways. He wound Douglas up, and he didn’t understand why Douglas lashed out at him – how could he? But sacking him meant admitting that Douglas was right, OJS should have gracefully folded her wings and settled into retirement. And Carolyn was in no mood to admit that Douglas was right.

Even Arthur had been less that delighted with Peter. That was the worst bit, watching him try to be nice to Peter. Arthur had never had to pretend before. Carolyn had decided that she would give Peter a glowing reference when he left. Maybe it would mask the guilt.

Carolyn breathed out a fog, poking at the flowerless stumps poking out of the ground. Even they didn’t want to make the effort.

Once, she had been convinced that Arthur was going to take over the airline, that he would learn, at last, and she could sit back and be rude to passengers and let him do all the hard work. Was that still the plan? She needed to talk to him, really. But the last capital ‘T’ Talk they’d had had been awful – she’d sat him down to tell him that Gordon had had a heart attack, and that she wasn’t going to go to the funeral, but he was old enough to make his own choices.

“Okay,” he’d said. And that had been it. He’d been more torn up over the dog.

In hindsight, she should have realised that it had something to do with who exactly Arthur saw as his father figure.

The worst part about these places was the choking air of memories. Memories carved in stone and buried in the soil. Bones. She’d been into bones, when she’d been very young, picketing the corpses of birds and rats, stuff the cats caught. Stuff she found in the garden. Arthur had never seemed to have any such macabre obsessions, tending less towards spooky and more towards sunshine.

She sighed out a cloud, tracing the letters in the stone with her eyes. “I miss you, Herc.” she whispered. No matter what she thought of the spooky, she had no patience for ghosts or spirits, communing beyond the grave. Souls. All that was left now was dirt.

At the funeral, she hadn’t cried. Arthur had, and Douglas, but she had bitten her lip and kept a straight face. She hadn’t wanted the pity. His family had been there, his sister and brothers. She hadn’t known them well. Herc had never been terribly forthcoming about his family. They’d always been pleasant, at Christmas or small gatherings, but Carolyn had never really gotten to know any of them.

Arthur had written a speech. His voice had shaken, and his hands as he delivered it, but even through his tears he read every word from the crumpled sheet in his hand. He had spent hours writing it out, getting it right, insisting that he wanted to say something. It was short, but he’d needed it. 

They’d driven home in silence. Carolyn had slept on the sofa, and Arthur hadn’t slept at all. He’d made her a coffee when she’d woken up, his eyes red and tired. And still, he’d tried to smile.

And then, time passed. Time had that habit, of pulling away and drifting on, dawn and dusk, dawn and dusk. Weeks passed. Months. 

She sighed again, a lump in her throat. “I wish you were still here, you bastard.” She closed her eyes, not fighting the welling tears. She hated crying in front of Arthur, but here, in the quiet evening, she allowed it. Nothing here to witness her except the trees.

“Arthur misses you. And Douglas, not that he’d say it.” Douglas had shown up for OJS’s first flight back bedraggled, bags under his eyes and a dullness to his wit. If Martin and Theresa hadn’t been there, if Martin hadn’t still been able to fly, she’d have cancelled the trip. She wouldn’t have trusted Peter alone with her aeroplane.

“Six months, Herc. Six months, and I still don’t know what I’m meant to do without you.” She wasn’t sure if anyone believed her when she said she was okay, but what else was there to do but pretend? Things weren’t normal, and she doubted they ever could be again. The best she could offer was to put on a frown and try to bicker. Even her snide comments felt flat.

Eventually, she stood back up, wincing at her joints, the cold, wiping away the last tears. She hated crying. She stared for another moment, then walked away. Home.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr, [sircarolyn](http://sircarolyn.tumblr.com/).


End file.
